One Good Cup of Coffee
With only 43 days in the Major Leagues, a player walks away with a lifetime of benefits
In a week during which Hall of Fame voting has brought out the worst in the game, I’m happy to focus on players at the opposite end of the spectrum. The nine players below complete my COVID 19 — the group of Major Leaguers whose journey to the Show was accelerated by the expanded rosters and robust injured lists triggered by the pandemic.
Lives are changed forever and for the better. Just one day in the big leagues provides the gift that can never be taken away, admission to the fraternity to which fewer than 20,000 belong. With 43 days of Major League service, though, benefits begin to accrue.
Forty-three days represents one-quarter of a year of service, the first threshold for a player to cross in pursuit of the coveted 10 years of service. Ten years of service currently translates into a maximum of $230,000 annually for a player who waits until the age of 62 to draw benefits. Not every player who reaches 10 years is a household name or the beneficiary of eight-figure salaries, so while there’s an enormous amount of pride associated with the accomplishment, there’s obvious financial implications as well.
In the pro-rated 2020 season, each day counted as 2.77 for service accrual, so it only took 16 days for players to reach that mark. Plenty on this list made it; many didn’t.
Jose Marmolejos, the inspiration behind this exploration, actually began the year with 61 days of service already in his pocket. He accrued time in 2017 while suffering an injury during Spring Training. Adding his 2020 season, which included his Major League debut, Marmolejos now has more than one year of service. Should he never accrue another day, he’d still be eligible for somewhere between $5,300 and $16,800 annually upon retirement, depending on when between the ages of 45 and 62 he began drawing benefits. Not bad for a guy who signed for $55,000 about 10 years ago.
I’ll save the present value calculations for the experts and get on with the baseball.
Jesus Cruz | RHP | STL
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that one of the best opportunities ever to punch your card to the Major Leagues was as a COVID-free pitcher in the Cardinals organization between August 15-19. During those five days, the Red Birds — fresh off their two-and-a-half-week pandemic postponement tour — played eight games. Eight games in five days! That’s a lot of innings to cover, and Jesus was good for one of them. Cruz had his contract selected on August 18, gave up two runs in one inning of work, and was sent back down the next day. Whatever the future holds for him, the Mexican-born pitcher had his cup of coffee.
Dany Jimenez | RHP | SF
Selected from the Toronto Blue Jays in the 2019 Rule 5 Draft, it was big leagues-or-bust for Jimenez. Turned out to be a little of both. The hard-throwing Dominican made the Giants’ Opening Day roster — as the Rule 5 parameters require — walked three in his debut while only recording one out, worked a three-up, three-down inning during his second appearance, and found himself back in the Blue Jays organization about a week later. Such is the life of many Rule 5 draftees. Interestingly enough, Jimenez is heading back to the Bay Area; the Oakland A’s selected him last month in the 2020 Rule 5 Draft.
Robinson Leyer | RHP | BOS
Leyer began his professional career in the Chicago White Sox organization in 2012. Along the way, he was sent to the prestigious Arizona Fall League, traded to the Cincinnati Reds, named to a Southern League All-Star team, signed and released by the Seattle Mariners, and finally signed not once but twice (in 2019 and again in 2020) by the Boston Red Sox. Unfortunately for Leyer, things didn’t go so well once he got the call in 2020: over six appearances comprising 4.2 IP, he gave up 11 runs on 12 hits, walking eight while striking out nine. I’ll save you the math and tell you his ERA was 21.21.
Brian Navarreto | C | MIA
You know what this list needs? A .400 hitter. Welcome, Brian Navarreto! Originally a sixth-round selection of the Minnesota Twins in the 2013 draft, Navarreto signed with the Marlins as a minor league free agent prior to the 2020 season. He debuted on August 23 and went 2-for-3. He played in one more game that month — going 0-for-2 — before he was designated for assignment and outrighted off the 40-man roster. And in an incredibly small sample size, the catcher better known for his defense hit .400.
Joseph Odom | C | SEA
The Mariners selected Odom from the Atlanta Braves in the Triple-A phase of the 2017 Rule 5 Draft, and that low-risk selection yielded a big leaguer in 2020. Odom was a part of the team’s three-man taxi squad when the season began, and he was on the active roster before the end of July. He hit .128 over 44 plate appearances, with 20 strikeouts and four walks. But, hey, once the Mariners moved on from him, Tampa Bay jumped in and signed him as a minor league free agent. He’ll be in Major League camp with the Rays this coming spring.
Mark Payton | OF | CIN
Have I mentioned it’s Rule 5 alumni week around here? Payton was plucked from the New York Yankees roster in the Triple-A phase of the 2018 Rule 5 Draft by the A’s, who lost him to the Cincinnati Reds in the Major League phase of the same draft a year later. More transactions ensued — from which I’m generously sparing you — so please trust me when I tell you that Payton ended up back with the Reds during the 2020 season. He went 3-for-18 in limited big league action with the Reds. When I saw him in 2015 with the Trenton Thunder, he was the fourth outfielder on a roster that included Aaron Judge. At the time, I never ever would have pegged him as a guy who would one day hit 30 home runs (even if it was in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League), as he did in 2019.
Roel Ramirez | RHP | STL
Ramirez found himself in the Cardinals organization via the July 31, 2018 trade that sent Tommy Pham to Tampa Bay. In a debut he’d rather forget about, Ramirez surrendered back-to-back-to-back-to-back home runs to Yoan Moncada, Yasmani Grandal, Jose Abreu, and Eloy Jimenez of the Chicago White Sox. Ramirez was optioned one day later and eventually removed from the roster, but he’s still with the Cards and will be in Spring Training with them this year.
Sterling Sharp | RHP | MIA
One more Rule Fiver? Please? Okay, the Marlins selected Sharp from the Washington Nationals in the 2019 Rule 5 Draft, and Sharp began his big league career just fine with scoreless outings against the Orioles and the Blue Jays. But after a particularly rough performance against his former team (three hits, three walks, four earned runs, and only one batter retired), he was designated for assignment, beginning the process that led to Sharp’s return to the Nats.
So here we are, nearing the end of the COVID 19 — nineteen players whose Major League opportunities were largely made possible by the pandemic. I checked my list, ran a very basic analysis called addition and realized that my list of 19 was missing a player.
Last week, we mentioned Royals pitcher Foster Griffin, who tore his UCL in his ML debut. Griffin was Kansas City’s first-round pick in 2014. In the second round that year, the Royals selected the righty who rounds out our list.
Scott Blewett | RHP | KC
I watched Blewett pitch in Lexington during the same trip when I also scouted Griffin. I really liked Blewett. He’s a 6’6 horse who is currently listed at 245 pounds, significantly filled out from the 210 pounds he weighed more than five years ago (when he was only 19 years old). According to pitch data from his three innings of work in the big leagues this past season, his fastball averaged 93 MPH, representing a nice bump from the 86-92 range I saw from him in 2015. His repertoire seems to have changed as well; the data shows he relied upon a slider that he didn’t have at all in his early professional days. This opportunity to reflect is one of the most enjoyable parts of scouting — not just deeming if you were wrong or right, but witnessing the progression of an athlete. There’s plenty more to turn over under that rock, and I’ll save that for another day. Blewett, himself, yo-yoed between the big league club and the Royals Alternate Training Site last season. He only made two appearances, making me confident that his Major League debut was hastened by the pandemic roster allowances.
Project Managers… or maybe Product Managers
The Seattle Mariners announced yesterday that two first-time managers will take over at the organization’s highest levels of minor league ball. Former big leaguers Kristopher Negron and Collin Cowgill were announced as the managers for AAA Tacoma and AA Arkansas respectively. Teams have augmented their approaches to the minor leagues over the past decade, assigning varying values to winning versus development. The lack of a minor league season this past year likely led to greater separation of philosophies between clubs. (Another topic for another day.) In the meantime, I’m curious to see how things unfold for Negron, Cowgill, and their teams. Mariners leadership hasn’t been afraid to do things differently. It makes me wonder how much they really care about who is managing, and if these new skippers wouldn’t be better labeled as Project Managers.
Thank you for reading Warning Track Power. This was a long one. Subscribe now to have WTP delivered to your inbox every Thursday, and be on the lookout for a special edition of the newsletter this Saturday.
Great read Ryan, thanks for the stats and stories, btw, 2 time ML Rule 5 selection, Dany Jimenez. Is this first time this has happened?